Like it or not, social media is setting the agenda of personal discussions in our world; people are comfortable talking about what they know their friends already have shared. So, if you want to open doors for members of the church to “go and tell” in discussion, you can help by first giving them something to set before their friends on social media so that the topic might just make it onto their face-to-face meeting agendas.
Every church should understand the purpose and function of its various digital ministries. The following simple distinction helps clarify, by biblical analogy, how two common digital ministries serve in different ways:
- Church website = Old Testament evangelism: Come and See
- Church social media accounts = New Testament evangelism: Go and Tell
In the Old Testament, God established Israel as his people and Jerusalem as the place of his habitation in his temple. The other nations who wanted to learn about the one, true God had to search there to learn what he revealed about himself and his salvation. Similarly, a church website generally hosts content for people to come and see by searching for the church or one like it. The information displayed there can be rich and full, and it serves the wonderful purpose of providing the seeker with the information he is looking to find, and maybe far more.